Czechoslovakia

by Maria Dowling

Release Date: April, 2002

Edition: Hardcover

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Psychologically inaccurate, but historically helpful.

Dowling presents a predominately accurate picture of the C/S unions and occupations, along with political commentary and insight. Her fault lies in consistently portraying CS as a bridge between east and west. True they are a 'eastern' people and they maintain 'western' style democracy, but there is no indication, rather a rebuffing of such mediator sentiment (shown in Stein's "Czecho/Slovakia"), that makes Dowling's often invoked theme an ambiguous one. I applaud her for her brief history of the state, but care not for her use of such ideologies which lead the reader on a quest to draw conclusions about intentions of Czechoslovakians based on little proven (almost manufactured) beliefs. The fact that the book does nothing to explain the lives of Czech and Slovak republics after the split is understood due to the title of the book, focusing only on the state of Masaryk's creation, but as a small history under Austria-Hungarian rule was necessary to introduce the nation, a mentioning of the divided republics would send the combined state to the graveyard of memory with some further dignity. All in all, the book definitely presents history for the reader, but the views presented can lead to inaccurate conclusions.